The Mapmaker's Sons (11 page)

The boy shrugged. “Maybe. He likes his coin. Give him a few bits and he'll take us to Willa. A few more and there might be a meal in it as well.”

He took Porter's money, darted across the street to the old man, and struck a deal.

He sprinted back and ducked behind the crates, lodging himself between Porter and Tom. “He says we can board as soon as he settles his goats.”

Porter gave a tight nod and sunk into a crouched position, breathing hard. Tom, his heart hammering against his ribs, did the same. He'd barely drawn a lungful of air when the sound of voices raised in anger drifted their way. He tensed, watching from behind the crates as a large group entered the square where they'd stopped. Keegan's Watch. Tom counted a dozen of them, their black boots pounding the pavement, their black capes swirling, their ruby-red eye clasps glowing in the late-afternoon sun.

Between the fore and aft guards walked a man and woman, barefoot and dressed in rags, accompanied by four similarly
dressed children. The eldest, a copper-haired boy, looked to be the same age as Tom and Porter. The boy lifted his chin in a bold gesture of defiance that might have been effective had the terror in his eyes not been so apparent. His sisters openly wept beside him, the youngest child shaking in her mother's arms.

Trailing them was a group of perhaps thirty townspeople. Some of their faces were stiff with barely contained rage, while others held only sadness, but they made no move to halt the procession. The group stopped as it reached a wooden scaffold in the center of the square. The Watch drew their swords and prodded the helpless family up the platform steps.

Tom's blood ran cold. “What is this?” he whispered. He turned to Porter, only to find that his brother's face had gone deathly white. “What?” he demanded. “Who are they?”

Porter let out a low, shaky breath. “That's the man who provided our Letters of Passage. They've already traced the forgeries back to him.”

“Maybe the townspeople will help them,” the boy whispered, his voice rough with desperation.

“No, they won't,” Porter said. “They can't. Their families would be next.” He drew a shaking hand through his hair. “They might hate it, but they'll let it happen.”

“Let
what
happen?” Tom choked out, barely speaking past the tight knot of fear in his throat.

“They'll make an example of them,” Porter lashed back, his pale eyes furious. “Like they do with anyone who tries to resist Keegan. They'll execute the parents now, and Carter as well. Or maybe they'll send Carter to work the ice mines in Ventus, get a few years of hard labor out of him before he dies. His sisters will probably be sold to a slave shipper in Aquat.”

The horror of what Porter was saying struck Tom like a
physical blow. Then something else struck him. “Carter,” he repeated. “You know him.”

Porter gave a tight nod. A muscle ticked near the base of his jaw. “A friend. We grew up together. Our parents knew each other well. They knew what was at stake. That's why they agreed to provide the Letters of Passage.”

Beside them, the boy shifted. “Old Raynard just gave the signal. He's leaving.”

Porter cut a glance toward the goat cart, then back to the scaffold. He gave a low growl and bit out an oath. “Not now. Not yet.”

Two members of The Watch moved to tie the man's hands behind his back. Two others tore the little girl from her mother's arms and lashed the woman's hands.

Raynard climbed into the cart's seat and lifted the reins.

Porter grabbed a handful of coins and thrust them at the boy, shoving him toward the goat cart. “Make him wait! Pay him whatever it takes!”

The Watch forced the man and woman into a kneeling position facing the crowd. Carter's sisters sobbed. Tom scanned the crowd. The faces he saw were tight and angry, but, as Porter had predicted, they made no move to stop what was about to happen.

“No,” Porter muttered, so softly Tom wasn't sure he'd heard him. Then he said it again. Firmly. Definitively. “No.” He grabbed a piece of lumber and moved to stand, as though intending to launch a single-handed attack on The Watch.

“Not like that.” Tom caught his arm and tilted his head toward the scaffold. “The rope.”

He waited a fraction of a second, just long enough for his meaning to be clear, then sprinted full speed toward the scaffold, Porter a heartbeat behind him. The structure was just under five feet high, made of roughly cut lumber supported by four corner pillars of stacked stone. Beside it was a thick coil of rope, perhaps last put in use when the scaffold served as a gallows. That didn't
matter. What did matter was that Tom had noticed the scaffold shake under the weight of the people atop it.

Which meant that it was unstable—and with any luck, would be relatively easy to knock down. They raced toward it from behind, so The Watch couldn't see them but the crowd could. Not slowing his stride, Tom reached down and grabbed one end of the rope while Porter grabbed the other. Tom coiled it around his wrist and slid under the scaffold as though stealing home plate, while Porter ran opposite him, pulling the rope taut from the outside.

Knocked sideways, the right rear pillar crumbled into a loose pile of stones. The scaffold tilted crazily, then listed like a ship taking on water. Tom scooted clear of the structure a second before it collapsed entirely. The Watch tumbled to the ground. The man, the woman, and their children tumbled after them.

In that instant, the crowd surged forward, shouting and shoving. In the pandemonium that followed, one woman grabbed the youngest girl and took off at a run. Others grabbed the remaining family members, pulling them away from The Watch under the cover of chaos and spiriting them to safety.

Porter shoved Tom toward the traveling goat pen. They jumped in, slipping between the boy and the goats, then pulled the cart's gate shut. The lower half of the pen was constructed of solid wood and matted with straw; the upper half, thin wooden slats through which the goats could poke their heads. They were relatively safe, Tom supposed, though he wasn't entirely sure how the term
safe
was defined here.

Tom took a jagged breath as Raynard flicked the reins and set the cart in motion. The old man paid them no notice, humming loudly to himself over the bleating of the goats and the rattle of the cart's wheels. The cart lurched forward and then began rolling at a steady, if bumpy, pace, leaving the demolished scaffold behind them.

Tom waited a few minutes, allowing the cart to lumber
farther down the badly rutted road, then rolled onto his belly and lifted his head, risking a glance at the scene they'd left. Only The Watch remained, angrily kicking through the debris. The crowd had vanished, taking the copper-headed boy and his family with them.

Tom rolled onto his back and sent Porter a smile. “You did it. You saved them.”

“Proof that you're not the only one capable of behaving like a complete idiot.”

Tom's smile froze, then splintered. “What are you talking about? He was your friend—you had to do something!”

Porter, the tension radiating from him so great that Tom could almost feel it, gave a curt shake of his head. “It was reckless. Unforgivably stupid.”

“What choice did you have?”

“Leave them.”

“You could have done that?”

Tom's disgust must have shown in his voice, for Porter jerked toward him, his eyes blazing. “You still don't understand? After what you just saw? Then let me be very clear. Carter doesn't matter, his family doesn't matter, you don't matter, I don't matter—
we
matter—but
only
if both of us are together, alive, because that's the only way we can find the sword. Because the only thing that
does
matter is finding the sword!” He drew back, his chest heaving. “You think what you just saw isn't happening somewhere else this very moment, to some other family? Keegan rules through terror. It may be his only trick, but it's a good one. Very effective.”

Tom watched him for a long moment. “If the only way to stop him is to find this sword, why didn't our parents come for me?”

Porter gave a bitter laugh, shaking his head.

“Why?”
Tom repeated.

The anger seemed to slowly drain out of Porter. A note of resignation crept into his voice. “Those last years under Keegan
were beyond difficult. Our mother and father began to doubt, to fear. They were convinced the burden was too heavy to place on us, the risk of failure too great.”

Tom blinked, confused. “You mean, if we fail to find the sword?”

“No.”

“Then what are you talking about?”

His brother looked him square in the eye. “What if, by finding it, we allow the most powerful weapon ever created to fall into the hands of a monster like Keegan?” He shook his head. “There were many who tried to convince our father to destroy the map he'd spent his lifetime creating. Now that you've had a glimpse of what Keegan is capable of, what do you think? Is it worth the risk?”

A heavy silence hung between them. The boy, who'd been quiet until that point, spoke. “But you won't fail! Everyone's heard of you.” He looked from Tom to Porter, his gaze eager. “The dark and the light. The Hero Twins, that's what they call you—come to end Keegan's rule!”

With an effort, Porter shook off his somber mood. “Yes, of course. The Hero Twins, come to end Keegan's rule.” A goat shifted in the cart, shoving his hindquarters in Porter's face. He gave the beast an impatient shove and stretched out his legs. “Unless, of course, we are killed in the attempt—a circumstance which seems to be growing increasingly likely with every passing moment.”

The boy fixed a look of fierce determination on his young features. “If I were to die, I'd rather be killed fighting Keegan than any other way.”

Porter looked at Tom. “Well, there you have it. We have little to fear. If all else fails and we fall into dire straits, we'll have this one on our side. All forty pounds of him.”

A heavy silence settled over them. A coarse linen sack, given to them by Raynard, sat beside the boy. The child opened it and withdrew the contents: a bottle of creamy white liquid,
three pewter mugs, and assorted foodstuffs—biscuits, cheese, apples, and some sort of dried meat. While the boy and Porter dove into the meal, Tom ignored it.

He removed the rolled parchment from his belt and opened his father's map. In the fading twilight, the purples, blues, and greens blurred together like blossoming bruises. He rubbed his fingers over the map's worn edges, hoping to feel some connection to a father he'd never known. Nothing. Nor did the map as it came alive thrill him the way it had in Professor Lost's office. Instead, a heaviness settled in his chest as his fingers traced the Five Kingdoms. Slave shippers in Aquat. Forced labor camps in the ice mines of Ventus. Public executions in Divino. And those were just the horrors he'd learned of today.

“Keegan rules all the Five Kingdoms?” he asked.

Porter shrugged. “Generally, yes. His minions run each kingdom in his stead. Warlords, mostly, no better than Keegan himself.”

Tom silently absorbed that, then turned his attention to the section of the map marked
The Beyond.
It was there that the sword had shown itself. A no-man's-land, marked only by signs of death and despair.

“This sword we're looking for … it's not just an ordinary sword, is it?”

Porter arched one blond brow. He took a deep drink, then wiped the creamy white foam from his lip. “Please don't tell me you've only just figured that out.”

“It's the Sword of Five Kingdoms,” the boy put in. He leaned toward Tom, his eyes glistening with excitement. “It has more power, more magic, than any weapon the world's ever seen.”

“Magic?”
Tom repeated, aghast. “A
magic
sword?”

“Of course.” The boy blinked.

Tom let out a harsh laugh and shook his head, groping for words. He brushed his fingers over the parchment document he'd been toying with. “Where I come from, things like this … monsters, magic, maps that come alive … none of it exists. None of it
can
exist. No one believes any of that's real.”